Trawling for Trash

The European Union is paying fishermen to trawl for trash, to clean up littered beaches like this one. (Photo
by Enviromantic/iStockphoto)

Visitors lingering over an alfresco
meal in the French Riviera
fishing village of Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat might be surprised to discover
that the catch of the day is
plastic trash. Since May, this scenic
harbor has been the pilot site
for a European Union Fisheries
Commission project designed
to protect declining fish stock
in the Mediterranean Sea while
also removing tons of plastic
debris from the sea.

The French government, supported
by the European Union
Fisheries Fund, pays for the fishermen’s
time. Europe’s plastics
industry provides special debris-collecting
trawl nets (which cost
from $23,000 to $57,000 apiece),
and also picks up the tab for recycling
and other costs.

Maria Damanaki, European
commissioner for maritime affairs
and fisheries, says the novel
effort is one of several action
steps needed to reduce pollution
and restore fish stocks in the
Mediterranean. The sea has become
“an open wound for biodiversity,
ecosystems, and our civilization,”
she warns. “The
situation of marine litter and especially
plastic litter has taken
threatening dimensions.”

When fishermen are trawling
for plastic debris, they
aren’t depleting already dwindling
fish stocks. Nor are they
throwing back dead fish that
bring low prices at market, a
practice known as “discarding”
that’s common in these waters.

Using government subsidies
to provide fishermen with an alternate
income makes good economic sense, according to Rashid
Sumaila, economist and director
of the Fisheries Centre at the
University of British Columbia.
By his analysis, nearly 30 percent
of the global fishing industry’s
$80 billion annual revenue comes
from government subsidies.
“Subsidies lead to overfishing.
This (fishing for trash) approach
leaves money in the fishing community
and uses subsidies to do
good work,” he says. Potential
benefits are threefold. “It helps
the fish, cleans the oceans, and
provides livelihood for fishers,”
Sumaila says. “It’s a beautiful solution,
if implemented well.”

Fishing for trash may be a
novel solution, but it represents
a mere drop in the ocean compared
to the size of the problem.
Once plastic bags reach the sea,
they start to break down into
tiny pieces of aquatic trash.
These bits can get into the food
chain, creating potential health
risks for a variety of species, including
humans. Researchers
estimate that there are 250 billion
plastic pieces submerged in
the Mediterranean, according to
Damanaki, and another 500 tons
of plastic floating on the surface
of the sea. Some 80 percent of
ocean pollution originates on
land, Sumaila adds.

Because the Mediterranean is
a closed sea, it’s especially vulnerable
to pollution. Cleanup efforts
will require a variety of measures.
Italy recently banned plastic bags,
and other efforts to reduce pollution
at the source are under way.
Meanwhile, Damanaki remains
hopeful that the “visible result”
of French fishermen hauling out
tons of plastic will encourage other
coastal communities to get in
on the act.

Her willingness to pilot new
ideas is drawing praise from
ocean researchers. “She’s doing
wonders,” says Sumaila, who
cautions that there’s much more
work to be done. “But this is a
good beginning.”

If trawling for trash proves
to be workable in the Mediterranean—which represents just 1
percent of the planet’s ocean
surface—the idea could set off
a wave of similar activity around
the globe.